Micah McCormick: I got a text from somebody this week.
Micah McCormick: Wait, you were in Kings, and now I'm seeing you're going to be in Ezra.
Micah McCormick: What happened to Chronicles?
Micah McCormick: We're not going to skip Chronicles, don't worry.
Micah McCormick: We're going to do it on a different Sunday night, but we'll hit Chronicles Tonight, though we're going to be in Ezra.
Micah McCormick: So turn over to Ezra.
Micah McCormick: Turn over to Ezra, chapter 2.
Micah McCormick: So that's in the Old Testament.
Micah McCormick: You got to go past Kings, past Chronicles, ezra 2.
Micah McCormick: I'll start at verse 1.
Micah McCormick: These now are the people of the province who came from those captive exiles King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon had deported to Babylon.
Micah McCormick: They returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to his own town.
Micah McCormick: They came with Zerubbabel, jeshua, nehemiah, sariah, rehaliah, mordecai, bilshan, mispar, bigvi, rahom and Banna.
Micah McCormick: The number of the Israelite men included Parash's descendants 2,172.
Micah McCormick: Shepthiah's descendants 372.
Micah McCormick: Arah's descendants 775.
Micah McCormick: Tehoth, moab's descendants, jeshua's and Joab's descendants 2,812.
Micah McCormick: Elam's descendants 1,254.
Micah McCormick: Zatu's descendants 945.
Micah McCormick: Zachai's descendants 760.
Micah McCormick: Bani's descendants 642.
Micah McCormick: Bebi's descendants 623.
Micah McCormick: Azgad's descendants 1,222.
Micah McCormick: Adonai Kim's descendants 666.
Micah McCormick: Bigvi's descendants 2,056.
Micah McCormick: Adin's descendants 454.
Micah McCormick: Adar's descendants of Hezekiah 98.
Micah McCormick: Bezi's descendants 323.
Micah McCormick: Jorah's descendants 112.
Micah McCormick: Hashem's descendants 223.
Micah McCormick: Gibar's descendants 95.
Micah McCormick: Bethlehem's people 123.
Micah McCormick: Netopha's men 56.
Micah McCormick: And Otha's men 128.
Micah McCormick: Asmava's people 42.
Micah McCormick: Kiriathim's, jepirah's and Beroth's people 743.
Micah McCormick: Rama's and Geba's people 621.
Micah McCormick: Micma's men 122.
Micah McCormick: Bethel's and Ai's men 223.
Micah McCormick: Excuse me, nebo's people 52.
Micah McCormick: Magbish's people 156.
Micah McCormick: The other Elam's people 1,254.
Micah McCormick: Hiram's people 320.
Micah McCormick: Lod's, hadid's and Onan's people 725.
Micah McCormick: Jericho's people 345.
Micah McCormick: Senna's people 3,630.
Micah McCormick: I'll stop reading there.
Micah McCormick: Let me pray.
Micah McCormick: Lord, we're asking again to give us this power in the scripture that we do have.
Micah McCormick: All of us who know the Lord.
Micah McCormick: We have an anointing from the Holy One and we know all things, but we want to know deeply.
Micah McCormick: We want to see and understand scripture as holy as we can.
Micah McCormick: So help us tonight in that.
Micah McCormick: In Jesus' name, amen.
Micah McCormick: Some of you know this song.
Micah McCormick: I don't think it's in our current hymn books.
Micah McCormick: It might have been in our previous hymn book, when the roll is called up yonder.
Micah McCormick: When the roll is called up yonder.
Micah McCormick: You might know that song.
Micah McCormick: That's a song about heaven.
Micah McCormick: Actually, bright and cloudless morning when the dead in Christ shall rise.
Micah McCormick: It's a song about heaven, but it mentions calling a roll.
Micah McCormick: Now there's the Lamb's book of life.
Micah McCormick: That's the list of those who are going to be in glory one day.
Micah McCormick: This is a different list, but it's still a list of people that we read.
Micah McCormick: And I could have kept going If you scan down there in chapter two, it talks about a number of other people's descendants right there in chapter 2.
Micah McCormick: So go ahead and turn over to chapter 8.
Micah McCormick: We'll be skipping around a lot in Ezra to give us kind of a picture of it.
Micah McCormick: Look at the way that chapter 8 begins.
Micah McCormick: These are the family heads and the genealogical records of those who returned with me from Babylon during the reign of King Artaxerxes.
Micah McCormick: And then if you look down in chapter 8, it lists another bunch of names and descendants.
Micah McCormick: There's another roll call.
Micah McCormick: Turn over to chapter 10.
Micah McCormick: Chapter 10, verse 18, the following were found to have married foreign women from the descendants of the priests.
Micah McCormick: From the descendants of Jeshua, son of Jezadek and his brothers.
Micah McCormick: And then it goes on down.
Micah McCormick: If you look down the way, the book of Ezra ends is with a list of these names again, the book of Ezra ends is with a list of these names again.
Micah McCormick: Now, not all of these lists.
Micah McCormick: There's three big lists here One towards the beginning of the book, one in the middle, one at the end.
Micah McCormick: They're not all identical but they're all a list of names.
Micah McCormick: It's a roll call of sorts.
Micah McCormick: It's a roll call for the exiles.
Micah McCormick: Go back to chapter one.
Micah McCormick: It's a roll call for the exiles.
Micah McCormick: Go back to chapter one, the way this book begins.
Micah McCormick: In the first year of King Cyrus of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken through Jeremiah, the Lord roused the spirit of King Cyrus to issue a proclamation throughout his entire kingdom and put it into writing.
Micah McCormick: This is what King Cyrus of Persia says the Lord, the God of the heavens, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and has appointed me to build him a house at Jerusalem, in Judah.
Micah McCormick: Any of his people among you.
Micah McCormick: May his God be with him and may he go to Jerusalem, in Judah, and build the house of the Lord, the God of Israel, the God who's in Jerusalem.
Micah McCormick: Let every survivor, wherever he resides, be assisted by the men of that region with silver, gold, goods and livestock, along with the freewill offering for the house of God in Jerusalem.
Micah McCormick: For the house of God in Jerusalem, the people of Israel, the Israelites, the same ones that God rescued out of Egypt and brought into the land.
Micah McCormick: This is years and years later.
Micah McCormick: They had disobeyed and God allowed the Babylonian people to come in and take them captive.
Micah McCormick: So Babylon is pretty far away from where Jerusalem is.
Micah McCormick: So at the time of the writing of Ezra, it does kind of pick up where 2 Chronicles leaves off.
Micah McCormick: So if you go back at the very end of 2 Chronicles 36, and notice verse 22 there in the first year of King Cyrus, and then verse 23, this is what King Cyrus of Persia says.
Micah McCormick: So 2 Chronicles ends with this decree of this King Cyrus.
Micah McCormick: If you wanna talk more about that with Kevin afterwards, he would just love to talk with you more about that, but that's not for tonight.
Micah McCormick: Well, 2 Chronicles is not for tonight, but Ezra picks up with this decree.
Micah McCormick: So the people have been in captivity in Babylon, but then another empire, the Persians, come in and they defeat the Babylonians.
Micah McCormick: So King Cyrus is, as you see in verse one there of Ezra, the king of Persia.
Micah McCormick: But he sets a decree that Jewish people are allowed to go back to Jerusalem from where they've been scattered.
Micah McCormick: They want to do that and help rebuild the house of the Lord.
Micah McCormick: So when Ezra opens, the people are in exile and there's a list of all these names at different places of the people that are coming out of exile.
Micah McCormick: So God brings his people out of exile, kind of.
Micah McCormick: In the New Testament, peter says of us today that we are pilgrims, strangers, exiles.
Micah McCormick: Hebrews uses similar language, we're in a different place than the Jewish people, but we're still, in some sense, exiles.
Micah McCormick: We're going somewhere.
Micah McCormick: So what does this book Ezra have for those of us who are in exile?
Micah McCormick: Well, it tells us that God is in charge no matter where we are.
Micah McCormick: God's in charge no matter where we are.
Micah McCormick: Cyrus wasn't David, wasn't Solomon, wasn't David and Solomon's son.
Micah McCormick: He was the king of Persia.
Micah McCormick: And yet God used this other king outside of the covenant community to get accomplished what he wanted to accomplish to get his people to go back.
Micah McCormick: In Isaiah 45, verse one it's a fascinating verse.
Micah McCormick: Isaiah says that Cyrus is God's anointed one.
Micah McCormick: Yeah, he's his Messiah.
Micah McCormick: Not that Cyrus was Jesus, but that Cyrus, this pagan king, god had his hand on him to accomplish a certain purpose in history.
Micah McCormick: In Isaiah 44, verse 28, cyrus is called God's shepherd.
Micah McCormick: That should be an encouragement for us in exile.
Micah McCormick: The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord.
Micah McCormick: He turns it wherever he wills.
Micah McCormick: God's in charge, whether we're in the geographic place we want to be or not, whether we're in the stage of life we want to be or not, whether things seem to be going well in our family and friends or not.
Micah McCormick: God's still in charge.
Micah McCormick: You see that throughout the book of Ezra.
Micah McCormick: I'll have you scan some verses here.
Micah McCormick: Look at chapter five.
Micah McCormick: Flip over a few chapters here.
Micah McCormick: Chapter five, verse five but God was watching over the Jewish elders Chapter 5, verse 12,.
Micah McCormick: But since our ancestors angered the God of the heavens, he handed them over to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, the Chaldean who destroyed this temple Doesn't mean that God won't discipline his people, but he's the one that handed them over.
Micah McCormick: It wasn't just God was napping and Babylon had a bigger army.
Micah McCormick: God was in charge.
Micah McCormick: Look at chapter seven.
Micah McCormick: Over just two chapters.
Micah McCormick: Chapter seven, verse number eight Ezra came to Jerusalem in the fifth month.
Micah McCormick: So the book opens these people that are allowed to go back by Cyrus.
Micah McCormick: The first wave comes back.
Micah McCormick: Ezra, the scribe that the book is named after.
Micah McCormick: He comes in kind of another wave of people here in the mid book, but look what it says he came to Jerusalem in the fifth month, during the seventh year of the king, verse nine he began the journey from Babylon on the first day of the first month and arrived in Jerusalem on the first day of the fifth month since the gracious hand of his God was on him.
Micah McCormick: Chapter 8, verse 18.
Micah McCormick: Turn there, if you would please.
Micah McCormick: 8, verse 18.
Micah McCormick: Turn there if you would please.
Micah McCormick: This is kind of a little mini refrain in this book, chapter 8, verse 18.
Micah McCormick: Since the gracious hand of our God was on us, they brought us Sherebiah, a man of insight and descendants of Mali.
Micah McCormick: Over to chapter 8, verse 31, just down a little ways.
Micah McCormick: We set out from the Ahava River on the twelfth day of the first month to go to Jerusalem.
Micah McCormick: It's like a big travel log, but God is with them wherever they are.
Micah McCormick: Verse 31,.
Micah McCormick: We were strengthened by our God and he kept us from the grasp of the enemy and from ambush along the way.
Micah McCormick: And this is the case even amidst opposition.
Micah McCormick: Even though there's this decree, the people start to rebuild and there are some other regional guys there in Jerusalem and they don't want the building to be successful, and so they start trying to oppose the building.
Micah McCormick: Hey, check out some of these historical records.
Micah McCormick: These Jewish people, I mean, they've had a history in this area.
Micah McCormick: They've done some pretty bad things.
Micah McCormick: You don't want to let them build their temple.
Micah McCormick: They're bad people.
Micah McCormick: So, even though these other bad guys in the book are trying to shape the story of Israel's history in a way that only highlights the negative things, and there's a little bit of success there for a while, and yet God's hand is on them, no matter where they are, even amidst opposition.
Micah McCormick: Another thing we can take away as people in exile from this book is that God's dwelling is our destination.
Micah McCormick: Yes, the people who are listed here, all these names, they want to go back to Jerusalem to build the house of God.
Micah McCormick: You know, it's not just like in Lord of the Rings.
Micah McCormick: They want to go back to the Shire just because they were from the Shire and it's so nice and pretty and everything there.
Micah McCormick: This is a little more narrowly focused.
Micah McCormick: The point is not just we happen to live in a certain geographical region and it gives us a feeling of nostalgia.
Micah McCormick: That's the place where God had chose to set his name.
Micah McCormick: That's the place where the original temple was constructed under Solomon.
Micah McCormick: So they're going back to set up this temple again, because the temple is God's dwelling place and they want to be in the presence of God.
Micah McCormick: They want to be where God himself dwells.
Micah McCormick: Chapter 1, verse 2.
Micah McCormick: I already read this verse, but just to look at it again here, verse 2.
Micah McCormick: I already read this verse but just to look at it again here, this king's decree, and it's fascinating.
Micah McCormick: He talks about the God of heavens, but he says that he's been appointed to build this God of heavens, a house at Jerusalem, in Judah.
Micah McCormick: So even the opening of the book puts our telescope right on the temple, the house of God.
Micah McCormick: If you go over to chapter two, towards the end of that chapter, verse 68, after they arrived at the Lord's house in Jerusalem, some of the family heads gave freewill offerings for the house of God in order to have it rebuilt on its original site Chapter 5, verse 2.
Micah McCormick: Let's go over chapter 5, verse 2.
Micah McCormick: Temple is central here.
Micah McCormick: Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua, son of Jehoshadak, began to rebuild God's house in Jerusalem.
Micah McCormick: The prophets of God were with them, helping them.
Micah McCormick: Go over to chapter 6.
Micah McCormick: We'll start at verse number 16 of chapter 6.
Micah McCormick: Then the Israelites, including the priests, the Levites, the rest of the exiles there's the roll call again celebrated the dedication of the house of God with joy.
Micah McCormick: From the dedication of God's house, they offered 100 bulls, 200 rams, 400 lambs, as well as 12 male goats as a sin offering for all Israel, one for each Israelite tribe.
Micah McCormick: They also appointed the priests by their divisions and the Levites by their groups to the service of God in Jerusalem.
Micah McCormick: According to what is written in the book of Moses, the exiles second time exiles has been used right here in this passage.
Micah McCormick: The exiles observed the Passover on the 14th day of the first month.
Micah McCormick: Let's read it Right at the heart of this return to God's dwelling is a celebration of Passover.
Micah McCormick: Right at the heart of their dedication of this renewed house are sacrifices.
Micah McCormick: If God's going to dwell with his people, there has to be sacrifice.
Micah McCormick: That's why the cross should be at the center of our lives.
Micah McCormick: If we want to have that relationship with God, there has to be sacrifice.
Micah McCormick: That's why the cross should be at the center of our lives.
Micah McCormick: If we want to have that relationship with God, there has to be sacrifice.
Micah McCormick: And Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed once for all for us.
Micah McCormick: So when we think about communion with God, when we think about being in his presence, it here gives us instruction about the nature of sacrifice, the importance of it gives us instruction about the nature of sacrifice, the importance of it.
Micah McCormick: And then, last big idea for us to think about tonight as we live in exile.
Micah McCormick: God has to change the heart.
Micah McCormick: I said at the beginning, ezra is about God bringing the people back from exile, kind of.
Micah McCormick: Why did I say that?
Micah McCormick: I mean they marched from Babylon, many of them, back to Jerusalem.
Micah McCormick: They got the temple all set up Like we're good to go right.
Micah McCormick: There's these repeated lists of names and numbers.
Micah McCormick: It's almost like the original book of Numbers.
Micah McCormick: When the people come out of Egypt, it's almost like the original book of Numbers.
Micah McCormick: When the people come out of Egypt, god had redeemed them before.
Micah McCormick: He had rescued them, before they had been a mighty nation before.
Micah McCormick: But why did they get into exile in the first place?
Micah McCormick: They were carefully cataloged.
Micah McCormick: God watched over them.
Micah McCormick: The book of Numbers lists all these tribes and clans and now it's like they're listing them again.
Micah McCormick: They're getting back in the land again.
Micah McCormick: Why does it have to happen again?
Micah McCormick: How many more times might it have to happen?
Micah McCormick: Turn to chapter 3.
Micah McCormick: They're out of exile, kind of Chapter 3, verse 10.
Micah McCormick: When the builders had laid the foundation of the lord's temple, the priests dressed in their robes and holding trumpets, and the levites descended from asaph, holding symbols, took their positions to praise the lord, as king david of israel had instructed.
Micah McCormick: Constructed.
Micah McCormick: King David was long dead, but he had been instrumental pun intended in the worship of the original tabernacle and the temple that Solomon was going to build Verse 11,.
Micah McCormick: They sang with praise and thanksgiving to the Lord, for he is good, his faithful love endures forever.
Micah McCormick: Then all the people gave a great shout of praise to the Lord because the foundation of the Lord's house had been laid.
Micah McCormick: That sounds like some kind of celebration, and it was, but verse 12, many of the older priests, levites and family heads who had seen the first temple wept loudly when they saw the foundation of this temple, but many others shouted joyfully.
Micah McCormick: The people could not distinguish the sound of the joyful shouting from that of the weeping, because the people were shouting so loudly and the sound was heard far away.
Micah McCormick: We do weep out of happiness sometimes, so there could have been an element of this, but it will pick up a bit in other books like Haggai, zechariah, nehemiah.
Micah McCormick: Part of what's going on is they remember the glory of the first temple and some of them think it's not quite what it was.
Micah McCormick: I mean it's great, and all the people that are seeing it for the first time, this is wonderful.
Micah McCormick: The older people remember something even better and they're out of exile, kind of.
Micah McCormick: Throughout this book of Ezra you'll see if you read it there's a lot of discussion of bringing precious metals and stones.
Micah McCormick: So when they're going to build this temple, they're not just going to look around and like, pick out some random desert trees and try to make it special.
Micah McCormick: They're not just going to look around and like, pick out some random desert trees and try to make it special.
Micah McCormick: They want it like the first one.
Micah McCormick: There's gold, there's silver, there's these kind of luxury items and precious stones.
Micah McCormick: And the people bring some of these precious stones from farther away, maybe almost like when they came out of Egypt.
Micah McCormick: They plundered, the Egyptians, brought some of their jewels and gold with them.
Micah McCormick: But the point of making that tabernacle special is only partial, because the Bible tells us ultimately God doesn't dwell in some human house made with hands.
Micah McCormick: He can't be confined to a building.
Micah McCormick: Peter, the same Peter who speaks of us as strangers and pilgrims, exiles, says that we're built together as precious living stones on the foundation of Jesus Christ.
Micah McCormick: So the ultimate need is for us to be transformed into a dwelling place of God.
Micah McCormick: To merely have a physical structure is not the end.
Micah McCormick: We are the temple of the living God.
Micah McCormick: Paul says in Corinthians Therefore, glorify God with your body.
Micah McCormick: We collectively as his body, his bride, the temple of the living God.
Micah McCormick: So the preciousness of these things helps us see that they needed a heart change.
Micah McCormick: They were in Egypt and they got out.
Micah McCormick: Then they came back, but there's still something that's not right about what's going on.
Micah McCormick: Over to chapter 9.
Micah McCormick: This is just towards the end of the book.
Micah McCormick: You might have heard when I read this in chapter 10, verse 18, that last list of people it begins the following were found to have married foreign women.
Micah McCormick: It's like okay, I mean, there's just kind of a note about where they're coming from.
Micah McCormick: That's actually a warning, it's a red flag In chapter 9, look how it begins here.
Micah McCormick: After these things had been done, the leaders approached me so this is Ezra now speaking and said the people of Israel, the priests and the Levites have not separated themselves from the surrounding peoples, whose detestable practices are like those of the Canaanites, hethites, perizzites, jebusites, Ammonites, moabites, egyptians and Amorites.
Micah McCormick: Indeed, the Israelite men have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons, so that the holy seed has become mixed with the surrounding peoples.
Micah McCormick: The leaders and officials have taken the lead in this unfaithfulness.
Micah McCormick: When I heard this report, I tore my tunic and robe, pulled out some of the hair from my head and beard and sat down devastated.
Micah McCormick: In our age that almost sounds kind of like racist.
Micah McCormick: Like what do you mean there's wrong for them to take foreign wives?
Micah McCormick: Keep in mind the context of what's going on here.
Micah McCormick: It wasn't about some all-time prohibition about intermarriage.
Micah McCormick: It says right there they took wives that had the practices like the Canaanites, the Amorites.
Micah McCormick: Those were the people that were idolaters rather than worshipers of God.
Micah McCormick: When they bring idolatry into their homes and families, it never goes well.
Micah McCormick: In fact, if you remember back to Bob's message from a few weeks ago, who was the person that was so instrumental in building the first temple?
Micah McCormick: Solomon, so the very first temple they had all of its glory.
Micah McCormick: Solomon's the key figure that helped to oversee it and dedicate it.
Micah McCormick: What was one of Solomon's biggest downfalls?
Micah McCormick: He married foreign women that the Lord had said they'll pull your heart after other gods.
Micah McCormick: So it's not an ethnic thing, but it very much is a God thing, right?
Micah McCormick: So we need to be careful and passages like this, unfortunately, have been used to teach against inter-ethnic marriage.
Micah McCormick: But it's not what the passage is about and that's a pretty significant error.
Micah McCormick: So I mentioned from the message this morning.
Micah McCormick: Exactly how you view the referent of the stars falling from the sky is not irrelevant, but it doesn't have the same kind of significance because it's still on the same path.
Micah McCormick: That's almost a different path, because you're taking God's image and saying God's image isn't good in all people and you're missing the whole point of what's going on here in Ezra.
Micah McCormick: What's going on here in Ezra is like what we find in Corinthians, where it says don't be yoked unequally with unbelievers.
Micah McCormick: What fellowship does righteousness have with unrighteousness?
Micah McCormick: That doesn't mix.
Micah McCormick: So even though the people are out of exile, they're still pursuing idolatry.
Micah McCormick: They're still willing to let the practices of the peoples around them so influence them that they haven't learned their lessons from the past.
Micah McCormick: So the book doesn't end so rejoicingly.
Micah McCormick: I don't.
Micah McCormick: Is that even a word?
Micah McCormick: Not sure.
Micah McCormick: But the book doesn't end happy in a sense.
Micah McCormick: You might've heard this expression.
Micah McCormick: You might have heard this expression.
Micah McCormick: You can take the people out of Babylon, but how do you get Babylon out of the people?
Micah McCormick: That's what's going on here.
Micah McCormick: They needed a heart change and they're still in exile as long as their hearts haven't been changed and transformed.
Micah McCormick: Now there is hope for us.
Micah McCormick: They do make a proposal and a covenant here to put away this idolatry.
Micah McCormick: At the end of the book there is corporate confession and mourning and another side application.
Micah McCormick: One of the reasons why we have, on Sunday mornings, a time of corporate confession is because we want to together acknowledge our sin.
Micah McCormick: We don't usually do all of the specific kinds of sins that Ezra does here, but Ezra sees himself as part of this group of people and he's wanting the whole covenant body to turn to the Lord.
Micah McCormick: Now, even though they have this covenant, it's gonna be an up and down road and we'll see that in other books, like Nehemiah, when we get to the prophet Taggai, zechariah, malachi.
Micah McCormick: There's still an up and down road.
Micah McCormick: The people are still, in one sense, in exile, waiting for the Messiah, the true cornerstone of the temple, to come to be laid.
Micah McCormick: There's an amazing turn that we can find encouragement from.
Micah McCormick: I hope, if you'll take just finally this morning or tonight, sorry, go over to Revelation 3.
Micah McCormick: While you're going to Revelation, chapter 3, there's a lot of names in Ezra, right.
Micah McCormick: There's a lot of names in Ezra, right.
Micah McCormick: That was their clan identity, but didn't help them.
Micah McCormick: When we're baptized, we're baptized into the name.
Micah McCormick: There's our roll call.
Micah McCormick: We've got a new name written down in glory.
Micah McCormick: We've got the name of Jesus Christ placed over us, that we belong to the people of God, we're part of his assembly.
Micah McCormick: And look what it says here in Revelation, chapter 3, verse number 12.
Micah McCormick: To the one who conquers, I will make a pillar in the temple of my God.
Micah McCormick: They're excited to build this temple in Ezra.
Micah McCormick: And here's Revelation saying you've got a place coming, I'll make a pillar and temple of my God, and he will never go out again.
Micah McCormick: I will write on him not the names of the people who were in exile and had hard hearts and married foreign wives and became idolaters.
Micah McCormick: I will write on him the name of my God.
Micah McCormick: We're owned and identified by the Lord, not by our sin.
Micah McCormick: Isn't that so wonderful.
Micah McCormick: God doesn't look at us and see us as sinful people.
Micah McCormick: He sees us with the name of his son.
Micah McCormick: That's what we have, that's our hope, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem which comes down out of heaven from my God and my new name.
Micah McCormick: When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be.
Micah McCormick: Let's pray, lord.
Micah McCormick: Oh, thank you, lord.
Micah McCormick: Thank you that we have our names written in the Lamb's book of life, that we don't have to be part of the role of sinners though we are sinners, we see ourselves as the chief of sinners yet we've been adopted into the family of God, we've been placed as living stones in this new temple.
Micah McCormick: We look forward to the day when this name is given to us permanently and finally, in an even greater way.
Micah McCormick: Lord, help us to look back and see that, even though we haven't reached our destination yet, we're there and we're walking as repentant people, hopeful people, expectant people.
Micah McCormick: We thank you that you are in charge, no matter where we are, that it's your dwelling that's our destination, and that you have changed our hearts.
Micah McCormick: And we want you more and more to change our own hearts and the hearts of those around us, that we might worship you with purity and love In Jesus' name, amen.